PGP FINAL PLACEMENTS 2014

IIM AHMEDABAD

24 February 2014

Ahmedabad

The placement process for the graduating batch of the Post Graduate Programme (PGP)

in Management at IIM Ahmedabad has been successfully completed within three

clusters with students being placed across various sectors and functions of their choice.

The successful completion of the recruitment cycle for the batch of 378 students stands

testament to the high quality of students at the institute and the robust nature of the

placement process that provides adequate flexibility to both students and recruiters.

Placement process

The placement process was conducted in two stages. The first was the laterals process

where firms interviewed students with work experience and offered them mid-level

managerial positions. The second stage was the final placement process where firms

were grouped into cohorts based on the profile offered, and groups of cohorts were

invited to campus across different clusters. As in previous years, students were

provided the flexibility of making a “dream” application to any firm of their choice in a

subsequent cluster even with an offer in hand. This gave students the flexibility and

choice to build careers in sectors of their preference.

Laterals process

About 50% of the batch was eligible for lateral placements, which provided students an

opportunity to optimally leverage their work experience. The laterals process included

firms from diverse sectors such as analytics, BFSI, consulting, consumer services,

pharmaceuticals and technology. Firms which participated in the laterals process

included Aditya Birla Group, Amazon, Google, Infosys, Latent View, Microsoft, Star TV

India amongst others.

Sectoral overview

Companies from multiple sectors across different geographies hired candidates for a

wide range of functions. Recruiters in the consulting space included global strategy

consulting and niche consulting firms: Accenture Strategy, A.T. Kearney, Bain &

Company, Booz and Company, The Boston Consulting Group, Ernst & Young, EXL,

KPMG, McKinsey & Company, Monitor Deloitte, Oliver Wyman, TSMG amongst

others. The financial services sector witnessed participation from global investment

banks and included Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citibank, Credit Suisse, Deutsche

Bank, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, Morgan Stanley, Nomura, Royal Bank of Scotland, UBS

amongst others. A large number of students took up roles in Sales and Marketing in

various companies such as Airtel, Asian Paints, HUL, ITC, Kraft, Nestle, Star TV India

amongst others. General Management and Leadership profiles were offered to students

by Aditya Birla Group, CK Birla Group, General Electric, Mahindra, Reliance Industries

Limited amongst others. Students secured roles in technology sector firms such as

Amazon, Cognizant, Google, HCL, Infosys, Latent View, Microsoft, Samsung amongst

others. A number of first-time recruiters such as Embibe.com, Fractal Analytics, Kepler

Cannon amongst others participated in the placement process.

Top recruiters

More than 125 firms participated in the placement process in 2014 including the laterals

process. In terms of number of offers, Accenture Strategy was the top recruiter across all

clusters having picked 18 students from campus. In the strategy-consulting domain,

apart from Accenture Strategy, The Boston Consulting Group extended 15 offers to

students while A.T. Kearney, Bain & Company and McKinsey & Company extended 7

offers each. In the niche consulting domain, EXL was the highest recruiter with 8 offers.

Among global investment banks, HSBC was the largest recruiter having picked 9

students for roles in investment banking, corporate banking and private banking. In the

consumer goods and services sector, Hindustan Unilever and Star TV India were the

leading recruiters having extended 6 offers each to students for roles in marketing and

the corporate executive office. Amongst general management firms, Reliance Industries

Limited was the largest recruiter with 8 offers. In the technology sector, Amazon was

the largest recruiter having extended 15 offers to students for roles in business

development and operations. Latent View and Samsung extended 7 offers to students

for roles in data analytics and business development.

Entrepreneurship

IIM Ahmedabad has always encouraged students to take up entrepreneurship as a

career and this year, thirteen students opted out of the placement process to start their

own ventures. The start-ups include an IT solutions venture to support the logistics and

transportation sector, a platform for improving the agriculture supply-chain, amongst

others. In line with its culture of fostering entrepreneurship, IIM-A offers a placement

holiday to these students wherein they will be allowed to participate in placements in

one of the next two years in the event that their venture does not work out.

Prof. Kirti Sharda, the Chairperson of the Placement Committee, IIM Ahmedabad said,

“The exciting opportunities offered by recruiters to IIM-A students facilitated better

recruiter-recruit fit. While the placement process helped our recruiters meet their talent

needs, it also enabled our students to get placed in roles of their choice, across diverse

geographies. The successful completion of Finals Placement Process once again

validates the trust held by our recruiters in the fairness and transparency of the

placement process at IIM Ahmedabad and in its distinguished student quality. We are

glad to announce that the PGP batch of 2012-14 has been placed and the PGP Final

Placement Process at IIM Ahmedabad is complete."

Tanishq Goyal, the Recruitment Secretary of IIM Ahmedabad said, “We, at IIM-

Ahmedabad, have always focused on building careers for our students; we do so by

providing them with the best opportunities. This year, our students got diverse

opportunities across different sectors like BFSI, Consulting, FMCG, Media,

Pharmaceuticals, PSUs, Technology & Internet, E-Commerce and Telecom among

others. Our unique cohort based process emphasizes on roles, which allows students

greater flexibility in making career choices. Our policies were deeply appreciated by

recruiters and overall, we are happy with the way the placement process panned out.”

Further details about the placement process including details about compensation will

be released in an audited report, as per the Indian Placement Reporting Standards

(IPRS), introduced by IIM-A in an effort to bring about greater transparency in B-school

placements across the country. The IPRS report for ‘Final Placements 2014’ will be

released 6 months from the date of graduation, and the link to the report will be shared

with all stakeholders, once released.